Esther, starting at chapter 4
{4:1} Now when Mordecai found out all that was done, Mordecai tore
his clothes, and put on sackcloth with ashes, and went out into the
midst of the city, and wailed loudly and a bitterly. {4:2} He came
even before the king's gate, for no one is allowed inside the king's
gate clothed with sackcloth. {4:3} In every province, wherever the
king's commandment and his decree came, there was great mourning among
the Jews, and fasting, and weeping, and wailing; and many lay in
sackcloth and ashes. {4:4} Esther's maidens and her eunuchs came and
told her this, and the queen was exceedingly grieved. She sent
clothing to Mordecai, to replace his sackcloth; but he didn't receive
it. {4:5} Then Esther called for Hathach, one of the king's eunuchs,
whom he had appointed to attend her, and commanded him to go to
Mordecai, to find out what this was, and why it was. {4:6} So Hathach
went out to Mordecai, to city square which was before the king's gate.
{4:7} Mordecai told him of all that had happened to him, and the exact
sum of the money that Haman had promised to pay to the king's
treasuries for the destruction of the Jews. {4:8} He also gave him the
copy of the writing of the decree that was given out in Shushan to
destroy them, to show it to Esther, and to declare it to her, and to
urge her to go in to the king, to make supplication to him, and to
make request before him, for her people.
{4:9} Hathach came and told Esther the words of Mordecai. {4:10}
Then Esther spoke to Hathach, and gave him a message to Mordecai:
{4:11} "All the king's servants, and the people of the king's
provinces, know, that whoever, whether man or woman, comes to the king
into the inner court without being called, there is one law for him,
that he be put to death, except those to whom the king might hold out
the golden scepter, that he may live. I have not been called to come
in to the king these thirty days."
{4:12} They told to Mordecai Esther's words. {4:13} Then Mordecai
asked them return answer to Esther, "Don't think to yourself that you
will escape in the king's house any more than all the Jews. {4:14} For
if you remain silent now, then relief and deliverance will come to the
Jews from another place, but you and your father's house will perish.
Who knows if you haven't come to the kingdom for such a time as this?"
{4:15} Then Esther asked them to answer Mordecai, {4:16} "Go, gather
together all the Jews who are present in Shushan, and fast for me, and
neither eat nor drink three days, night or day. I and my maidens will
also fast the same way. Then I will go in to the king, which is
against the law; and if I perish, I perish." {4:17} So Mordecai went
his way, and did according to all that Esther had commanded him.
{5:1} Now it happened on the third day that Esther put on her royal
clothing, and stood in the inner court of the king's house, next to
the king's house. The king sat on his royal throne in the royal house,
next to the entrance of the house. {5:2} When the king saw Esther the
queen standing in the court, she obtained favor in his sight; and the
king held out to Esther the golden scepter that was in his hand. So
Esther came near, and touched the top of the scepter. {5:3} Then the
king asked her, "What would you like, queen Esther? What is your
request? It shall be given you even to the half of the kingdom."
{5:4} Esther said, "If it seems good to the king, let the king and
Haman come today to the banquet that I have prepared for him."
{5:5} Then the king said, "Bring Haman quickly, so that it may be
done as Esther has said." So the king and Haman came to the banquet
that Esther had prepared.
{5:6} The king said to Esther at the banquet of wine, "What is your
petition? It shall be granted you. What is your request? Even to the
half of the kingdom it shall be performed."
{5:7} Then Esther answered and said, "My petition and my request is
this. {5:8} If I have found favor in the sight of the king, and if it
please the king to grant my petition and to perform my request, let
the king and Haman come to the banquet that I will prepare for them,
and I will do tomorrow as the king has said."
{5:9} Then Haman went out that day joyful and glad of heart, but
when Haman saw Mordecai in the king's gate, that he didn't stand up
nor move for him, he was filled with wrath against Mordecai. {5:10}
Nevertheless Haman restrained himself, and went home. There, he sent
and called for his friends and Zeresh his wife. {5:11} Haman recounted
to them the glory of his riches, the multitude of his children, all
the things in which the king had promoted him, and how he had advanced
him above the princes and servants of the king. {5:12} Haman also
said, "Yes, Esther the queen let no man come in with the king to the
banquet that she had prepared but myself; and tomorrow I am also
invited by her together with the king. {5:13} Yet all this avails me
nothing, so long as I see Mordecai the Jew sitting at the king's gate."
{5:14} Then Zeresh his wife and all his friends said to him, "Let a
gallows be made fifty cubits high, and in the morning speak to the
king about hanging Mordecai on it. Then go in merrily with the king to
the banquet." This pleased Haman, so he had the gallows made.
{6:1} On that night, the king couldn't sleep. He commanded the book
of records of the chronicles to be brought, and they were read to the
king. {6:2} It was found written that Mordecai had told of Bigthana
and Teresh, two of the king's eunuchs, who were doorkeepers, who had
tried to lay hands on the King Ahasuerus. {6:3} The king said, "What
honor and dignity has been bestowed on Mordecai for this?"
Then the king's servants who attended him said, "Nothing has been
done for him."
{6:4} The king said, "Who is in the court?" Now Haman had come into
the outer court of the king's house, to speak to the king about
hanging Mordecai on the gallows that he had prepared for him.
{6:5} The king's servants said to him, "Behold, Haman stands in the
court."
The king said, "Let him come in." {6:6} So Haman came in. The king
said to him, "What shall be done to the man whom the king delights to
honor?"
Now Haman said in his heart, "Who would the king delight to honor
more than myself?" {6:7} Haman said to the king, "For the man whom the
king delights to honor, {6:8} let royal clothing be brought which the
king uses to wear, and the horse that the king rides on, and on the
head of which a crown royal is set. {6:9} Let the clothing and the
horse be delivered to the hand of one of the king's most noble
princes, that they may array the man whom the king delights to honor
with them, and have him ride on horseback through the city square, and
proclaim before him, 'Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king
delights to honor!'"
{6:10} Then the king said to Haman, "Hurry and take the clothing and
the horse, as you have said, and do this for Mordecai the Jew, who
sits at the king's gate. Let nothing fail of all that you have spoken."
{6:11} Then Haman took the clothing and the horse, and arrayed
Mordecai, and had him ride through the city square, and proclaimed
before him, "Thus shall it be done to the man whom the king delights
to honor!"
{6:12} Mordecai came back to the king's gate, but Haman hurried to
his house, mourning and having his head covered. {6:13} Haman
recounted to Zeresh his wife and all his friends everything that had
happened to him. Then his wise men and Zeresh his wife said to him,
"If Mordecai, before whom you have begun to fall, is of Jewish
descent, you will not prevail against him, but you will surely fall
before him." {6:14} While they were yet talking with him, the king's
eunuchs came, and hurried to bring Haman to the banquet that Esther
had prepared.
________________________________________________________________________
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